


Light in the Dark

by youreyestheyglow



Series: Firsts [4]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Fluff, Food, M/M, Smut, trans!jean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-28
Updated: 2015-03-28
Packaged: 2018-03-20 00:12:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3629424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youreyestheyglow/pseuds/youreyestheyglow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco and Jean have dinner and sex. Marco's mom calls.<br/>First time making love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Light in the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> I should've based this series around food.  
> It hasn't been /quite/ two months, so I think I'm getting better at updating this series. I hope it's worth the wait!

You’re not avoiding him, this time. You swear.

It’s just that things have gotten busy for you – there was an incident, and then there was _another_ incident, and then someone paid you a whole fuckton of money to make sure there were several more incidents along the same lines – and you’re still busy covering your tracks. Basically, you haven’t done anything but work for a good few weeks.

Jean actually sounds mildly surprised when you call him up. “Marco! It’s – been a while, I was worried –”

“No, I’ve just been busy. You’ve been watching the news?”

“’Course, I always keep track. Why?”                                                

“Past few weeks, I’ve been behind every single headline.”

“Holy shit.” You hear a chair creaking. “So you haven’t been avoiding me?”

“No.”

He laughs, a little breathlessly – relieved? “Whew.”

“Actually, I called because I missed you.” All noise on the other end of the line ceases. You barrel forward before your brain can catch up to you and tell you to _stop, what the fuck are you doing, why are you saying this –_ “What are you doing Thursday night? It’s my first free day in a while, and I planned on staying in and making dinner, maybe watching a movie. Would you like to join me?”

The silence on Jean’s side is deafening for precisely half a second before – “Yeah, I’d love to, what time do you want me there? Do you want me to bring anything?”

Too casual. He’s more excited than he’s letting on.

“How does 7 sound? And don’t bring anything, but you have to help me cook. Deal?”

“Deal.”

You laugh. “Probably the best deal I’ve made in weeks, honestly.”

“What, did you not make enough money off of them?”

“No, no, they were just time-consuming. And annoying.”

“Ah.”

You rub your eye. “But for the most part, they’re all tied up and done.”

“For the most part?”

“There are a couple with loose ends, but I should be able to clear those up in a couple days. Nothing big.” Your computer beeps. “And I just got an email I’ve been waiting for – I should be able to finish off another job now. I’ll see you Thursday?”

“Thursday,” he confirms.

You bury your face in your hands when you hang up. This is – weird. All of this – everything – is out of the ordinary.

Your behavior, for starters. Admitting that you miss someone? Not normal, not good. Admitting _any_ form of emotional attachment could bring trouble down on your head. Discussing work with someone is bad, asking for trouble, asking to be hunted down by the FBI. It’s out of character and out of the ordinary. You’re – irrational. Irrationally in love, because even if you can’t admit it out loud, you’ve never seen the point in lying to yourself. You love this man. You barely know him and you love him – his way of talking to you, the strange turns conversation with him takes, the way he draws out your childish side but leaves you intact. Your behavior is wrong, strange, but easily explained.

  _His_ , though, his behavior is weird. Not that you know how he normally acts, but this was _not_ how he acted the first time you met him, and you’re willing to bet that even that isn’t how he acts when he meets other clients. Unless, of course, he actually _does_ seduce every business partner he meets. You’re not sure if you’re the only one stupid enough to fall for it or if everyone does, and he has several dates a week with different people.

You rub your temples. You’ll be thinking in circles all day if you go down this road.

But –

Even assuming he saw you, _you_ , and his first thought was _wow what a hottie I wanna tap that_ , and assuming that this response was unique to you and not a product of a heightened sex drive – it’s weird. He’s being very open with you. He’s not in control of the situation, or of his responses. He’s letting you take the lead.

Gathering information about Jean Kirschtein is nigh impossible. Gathering information about him subtly, without making it obvious that you’re interested in him and without him finding out is _actually_ impossible. And what you’ve got is entirely contradictory.

One man said that he’d been in control of the situation right up until the end, when he realized that Jean had been playing with him the whole time. One person said Jean had shown up, gotten straight down to business, and left within five minutes. Someone else said that Jean had taken control the second he’d walked into the building. For the most part, everything you’d gotten people to tell you about had been along the lines of _he makes no sense, don’t try to read him, don’t think for half a second that you have control, nothing is settled until you have his money in your bank account. Don’t be fooled by his clothing – he has more power than you do._

You wonder if the only reason you think you have control is because Jean’s playing with you. Maybe the only reason you think you can read him is because he’s performing so well that the idea that you’re reading him wrong is just unacceptable. Maybe opening up to him was the worst mistake you could’ve made, because now he knows that all he has to do to get your guard down is make you laugh. Maybe he’ll burn your house down just for the fun of reminding you of past traumas. Maybe inviting him over to _help you cook_ and handle _fire_ and an _oven_ is nothing short of pure idiocy.

You’re going to call him and call it off.

You dial Sasha’s number instead.

“Marco? Everything okay?”

“Am I paranoid?”

She snorts. “Yeah, why?”

“Thanks. But the point of this is – would it reveal overwhelming amounts of paranoia if I called Jean and called off our date?”

“Your date?”

“I invited him over for dinner. I asked him to help me cook, actually.”

“When did you do _this_ , you didn’t tell _me_ –”

“I just called him ten minutes ago.”

“ _If you call off this date it won’t be him you have to worry about –_ ”

“All right, all right, but would it –”

“Yes, you’re paranoid, yes, it’s pretty much entirely unnecessary, and yes, I will _definitely_ wait around the corner with my phone on loud in case anything happens, and no, that won’t be a problem, because I will probably be napping or eating, and either way I’ll be happy.”

“Hiring you was the best decision I ever made.”

“Aw, you’re so sweet. When’s the date?”

“Thursday at 7.”

“Cool. I love this. I basically get to stalk you on your date, and you’re making it _easier_ for me. What a wonderful world this is.”

“You’re probably not going to be staring in through my window, though, right?”

“Mm. We’ll see.”

“ _Sasha_.”

“I won’t, I won’t!”

You huff.

She huffs back.

“Tell Connie I said hi.”

She doesn’t take the phone away from her mouth. When she yells “CONNIE, MARCO SAYS HI _,”_ she screams it directly into your ear.

You can hear Connie when he bellows back: “HI, MARCO!”

“Connie says hi,” Sasha tells you.

“I heard.”

“Oops, did I scream in your ear again? Sorry.”

“Apology accepted.”

“Bye, Marco! See you – or, hopefully, I won’t see you – Thursday.”

“Bye, Sash.”

 

You keep busy.

You tie up loose ends. You keep an obsessive eye on your email. You consider dinner recipes. You think about movies. You watch your phone and pretend you’re not watching your phone. You have Sasha and Connie over for lunch, find Sasha sneaking guiltily out of your room, notice that when she leaves her purse is _much_ lighter when she leaves than it was when she got there, and spend quite a bit of time trying to figure out what she put in your room. Whatever it is, it’s not in your bedside table or your wardrobe, so it’s gotta be in your closet somewhere. You’ll figure it out next time you need something from your closet.

All in all, you manage to pretend you’re not thinking about Jean for the entire four days leading up to your date.

Thursday finds you a little bit jumpy, as exemplified by the way you nearly fall on your phone when it rings. It’s 6:30 – is he calling to say he’s not coming? – but it’s Sasha, saying – “I’m around the corner, I can be there in two minutes if you need me, why are you freaking out, yes you are freaking out I can hear it, everything is gonna be great and you’re gonna have fun” – and you hang up feeling more jumpy than before, if that’s actually possible.

Jean arrives at 7:00 on the dot – and maybe it’s because you’ve been thinking about it over the past couple days, but it strikes you that this is very different from the Jean you were warned about, the Jean who couldn’t be punctual if his life depended on it.

He’s wearing pink pants and a purple shirt and it’s all nice, probably very expensive, and the top button is undone and it’s all casual, like he’s about to go for a walk on the goddamn beach, and he’d look so good with his sleeves rolled up and his pants rolled up so he could walk in the surf and the wind could ruffle his hair and – you’re staring and it’s embarrassing. “Come in,” you say, standing aside so he can step inside.

He grins at you. “You look good.”

You look like shit compared to him, but at least your jeans are nice jeans and you’re wearing a button-down shirt. “You look better.”

“We’re both handsome fuckers. What are we making today?”

You acquiesce. He won’t let you be humble; no point in fighting it. “Shrimp linguine.” You freeze. “You’re not allergic to seafood, are you?”

“Nope.”

“Hallelujah.”

“Any particular reason? Why we’re having shrimp linguine?”

“Shrimp needs to be sautéed, and I can’t sauté, and I miss shrimp.”

“You can’t sauté?”

“I don’t have the depth perception required to shake the pan. And when I learned how to judge depth well enough to sauté things, well – it’s hot oil that’ll burn me if I shake it too hard. It took me a while to get over that. And by the time I was ready to cook again, I’d gotten too used to _not_ cooking.”

“I – are you sure you wanna cook this?”

“Well, mostly I was planning on stirring the linguine once every minute and watching _you_ cook the shrimp. So yes. And I hope you know how to sauté.”

 He smiles reluctantly. “Yeah, I can do that.”

And that’s how you get fifteen minutes dedicated solely to staring at Jean while he cooks.

You do all the easy stuff – filling the pot, waiting for it to boil, salting it, dumping the linguine in, stirring every so often – and you watch as Jean does all the hard stuff.

You could get used to having him in your kitchen.

He rolls up his sleeves and unbuttons another button and gets to work.

Jean smiles a lot while he cooks, and that’s when you understand that he actually _cooks_ , and very often. He’s comfortable in front of your stove, handling the pan in a way you never could – and you don’t just mean after you lost your eye, you mean that you were always particularly shitty at cooking, and he is not. The recipe you printed out calls for parsley, lemon zest, lemon juice, and red pepper flakes, all added without burning the shrimp or the garlic already in the pan, and you know for a fact that you would not have managed that. It would’ve been edible, sure – you _did_ have to feed yourself for a very long time – but it wouldn’t have been _good_. It’s pathetic, you know, and your mother often groaned and muttered that you would starve if left on your own – but you never got the hang of cooking. Most of it required some idea of timing (“sauté until the shrimp are pink” – how pink? Light pink? Deep pink? How light pink? You have no goddamn idea) and you never had that.

Then again, the recipe was listed under _simple_ , so maybe you’re just a failure as a chef, and playing up Jean’s abilities for no reason. This isn’t exactly a five-star meal.

You’re still perfectly happy to glance appreciatively at Jean’s ass and his forearms and the profile of his face.

It’s a nice view.

He manages to finish the shrimp twenty seconds after you’ve strained the pasta, crowing “Perfect timing!” as he pours the shrimp into a bowl.

He tosses it for you, too.

You’re in love.

You’re halfway through your bowl before you speak: “Please, please come over and cook dinner every night. Holy shit.”

“Do you not cook?”

“Not really. I’ve never been good at it.”

“I can teach you, if you’d like.”

You’re about to turn him down, but – it would be good to learn. And you’d get to see Jean more often, presumably. “I’d love that.”

Jean’s eyes darken. You realize that you might’ve put more meaning into that than you meant to.

You should probably correct any misleading implications, but – you’re not quite sure how misleading they were, in the end.

When you open your mouth, you just shove more pasta into it.

Of course, this brings up more problems, like the fact that at some point, you will probably want to be naked in front of Jean, and turning the lights off only does so much.

“Marco? Are you okay?”

“Hmm?”

“You looked a little – lost in thought.”

He looks mildly amused. And by _mildly_ you mean he’s on the verge of laughing at you.

“Uh. Yeah.”

“Uh. Okay.”

“Rude.”

“Sorry.”

He actually looks contrite.

You laugh.

His mouth twitches, and you grin at him – but he doesn’t laugh. He sighs instead.

“You know, sometimes I wish I didn’t kiss you, the first time we met.”

It actually takes you a minute to switch tracks – from gentle teasing and laughing to _what did he just say does he mean what you think he means –_

“No, no, you look – no, I don’t mean –” For the first time since you’ve met him, he stumbles over his words. “I _mean_ , it was a shitty way to start things, and I should’ve asked you – and it was a fucked up impression to give you – and correct me if I’m wrong, but I think half the reason you’ve been – having doubts – about this whole thing is because I kissed you the first time we met? And I mean, you’re totally right to question that, it was a dick move –”

His voice shrinks to a mumble as you stare at him.

For some reason, the only thing you can say is – “So you don’t kiss everyone you make a deal with?”

He shakes his head. He sounds particularly subdued as he says – “I usually keep my personal life very, very separate from my business life.”

You close your eyes.

He’s telling the truth. You know he is. There’s no reason for you to believe him, but you do.

And that means that you’re safe – that he’s not just getting close to you, that he’s not just using you, that he’s not going home and making fun of you, the idiot who agreed to date him – that this isn’t the stupidest, riskiest thing you’ve ever done in your life, that you’re allowed to date him and be happy about it, that you can stop worrying and wondering –

“Marco?” He asks softly.

“Jean?” You open your eyes. “Can I kiss you?”

“I –” he gapes at you. “I – yeah. Now?”

 _Now_.

He looks a little bit frozen.

You decide to save him the trouble of reassembling his train of thought.

You have _no_ idea how to do this – (when was the last time you did this) (was it with Annie -) – it’s been so long since you did this that you barely remember how to look good doing it, but you manage to stand without tripping and walk around the table without losing eye contact with Jean. You must be doing all right, because you think he stops breathing when you place your hand on his cheek and he’s _clearly_ not thinking about the fact that you _have_ to touch his face or your depth perception might fail you and you might just smash your face into his and –

It’s not unexpected – it’s not a surprise – it’s not full of tears and fears that eat at you until you’d do anything for reassurance. It’s just a kiss –

Until Jean shoves his chair out, ripping himself away from you –

And then grabs at you, gently, pulling you back towards him, running his hands down your sides to your thighs and tugging you into his lap.

You go willingly, straddling him and the chair, breath hitching as he kisses your jaw and your throat and he’s unbuttoning your shirt and kissing your collarbone and –

You pull back.

“Marco? You okay?” He asks, caressing your cheek.

“I didn’t bother getting skin grafts. I got them on my face and neck, but not my arm. Not my torso.”

“I’ve seen your arm. And your torso. I’ve seen it all, Marco, and I love it.”

“I know, but –”

He waits while you struggle to articulate precisely what it is that’s different, this time.

You give up after a couple minutes. “I don’t know, I’m sorry –”

“It’s okay,” he murmurs. “Can I take your shirt off?”

You nod.

He removes your shirt easily enough, and there you are, sitting in the bright kitchen lights, one side of your body untouched and the other harsh and raw.

Jean stares at it.

Stares at your arm.

Reaches up to take off your eye patch and stares at your empty socket too.

You’re suddenly very aware of the fact that you’re sitting in his lap and all it would take is one good push for you to be on the floor.

“Marco, you know you’re gorgeous, right?”

You flush.

He’s laughing at you when he kisses you, kissing you through his laughter, kissing you as his fingers dance over your ribs and rub circles over your hips –

He’s done laughing by the time you start unbuttoning his shirt, fingers frantically tugging at the buttons, hands sliding over his skin the second you can get his shirt out of the way –

He’s shrugging out of it, helping you, grasping at you and gasping with you and _whining_ as he undoes the button on your pants and tugs the zipper down and he’s grinding up against you and – either you unzipped his pants or he did but regardless you’re sticking your hand down his pants – and noting the panic in his eyes as he grabs your hand and casually says “oh, yeah, probably should’ve told you before, I’m trans, I hope that’s not a prob-” but you don’t care, you couldn’t even begin to care if your life depended on it – you just catch his lips again and moan into his mouth and try and drag his pants down and remember he’s sitting, you’re sitting on him, fuck that’s frustrating –

So you get off him and tug at his pants and he stands so you can pull his pants off him and he’s trying to grab at yours but you push him back into his chair and kneel between his legs and glance up at him and his pupils are blown wide and you grin and dive in, licking into him and wrapping an arm around his thigh so you can hold his leg there, and you could get used to the way his thighs quiver around your head and how his fingers grab your hair when you flick your tongue straight down and the way he moans your _name_ –

You can feel his thighs shuddering around you, tightening –

He wrenches your head backwards, muscles shaking, and you’ve seen people with vaginas orgasm and that was _not_ it –

He’s shaking, kissing you desperately, muttering “ _fuck me, fuck me_ –” dragging you into his lap again and _standing_ –

He carries you into the hallway and you murmur “ _end of the hallway_ –” and he carries you into your own friggin bed and you don’t even _care_ because you’re pulling off your pants and you fucking _forgot_ about how hard you are, taking your pants off is the greatest thing that’s happened to you since –

“ _Where the fuck are condoms –_ ”

And you’re staring into your closet, you _know_ there are some here, because _of course_ that’s what Sasha stuck in here (you hope you’re right you hope you’re right) –

Condoms _and_ lube, you’ll have to thank her later –

Jean doesn’t even bother with the lube, just snorts and says “I’m so wet lube won’t make a damn difference, just _stick your dick in me for fuck’s sake_ –”

You fumble the condom on and tug Jean into your lap –

He’s running his hands over your stomach, over your ribs, tracing skin that hasn’t felt anything but your clothing in too long to even think about right now, and he’s grabbing your arms as he slides down on you, squeezing your biceps so hard you think he might break your arms as he clenches and shudders around you –

And then he’s moving, grinding down on you, face scrunched up as he whines, and you’re grabbing at his hips and kissing every square inch of his face and he’s so close to you it doesn’t _matter_ that you’re not paying enough attention to figuring out precisely how far away he is –

And it doesn’t take long for you to reach the edge, not with the way Jean is moaning against your mouth, not with the way he’s shivering and shuddering and _throbbing_ around you and he doesn’t give you time to sit on the edge he takes you all the way over and lets himself fall, too, finally, _finally_ –

 _Finally_ –

Jean wraps himself around you.

You stroke his back.

He kisses your chest.

Jean groans. “I don’t think I can move my legs.”

You pick him up, carefully, noting the way he grimaces as he slides off you, and realize he was using his thigh muscles the whole time. You didn’t even notice what position he was in or how uncomfortable it was.

He runs a hand through his blue hair once he’s in a comfortable reclined position, watching you with _way_ too much interest as you pull the condom off and throw it out. He doesn’t stick to staring at your left side, either – he lets his eyes roam indiscriminately over _all_ of your skin – or, everything he can see in the light streaming in from the hallway, anyway.

You wave at him to stay there as you head into the kitchen to collect the clothing the two of you shed and shut off the lights. You ignore the dishes – you can wash them in the morning – and make your way back to your room in the dark.

You turn on the lamp on your bedside table and crawl into bed.

“Is that your phone ringing?” Jean murmurs.

“Hmm?” And then you hear it – “Yeah.” You crawl back out of bed and find your pants. The call ends before you dig your phone out of your pocket – Sasha.

And –

Nope. Dealing with Sasha first.

You shoot her a text – _It’s going fine. Thanks for the condoms. I’ll pay you back for them next time I see you. You can go home, sorry for being paranoid._

Jean hoists himself up onto his elbows. “You’re making a face. Who called?”

“My mom.”

He grins. “Gonna call her back?”

“I have to.”

“Why do you say that like it’s a bad thing?”

“My sister has children. I do not. I am the child who did not give her grandkids.”

“You have a sister?”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve never mentioned her,” he says cautiously.

“Mina. Very nice. Very _very_ nice. Got married, had kids, berated me for my – lifestyle, which is not conducive for children. Haven’t spoken to her much since then. My mom keeps in touch with both of us, of course. Makes for fun conversations. Do you mind if I call her?”

“Not at all. Do you want me to leave? I don’t wanna listen in if it’s personal –”

“Do you speak Italian?”

“Nope.”

“You won’t be listening in.”

He settles back down and you call your mom back.

“Marco, you didn’t answer your phone, are you avoiding me now?”

Slipping into Italian is a little bit like coming home. “No, mama, no, I didn’t hear the phone ring.”

“Are you deaf, now? I know you never put your phone down, or I’d be impressed that you’d managed to live without technology for a few minutes.”

“No, I actually didn’t have my phone on me.”

That shocks her into silence for a short half-second. “Marco Bodt, who are you sleeping with?”

You flush straight up to your hairline.

Jean sniggers.

You wish you could glare at him, but he’s on your right side. “A man, mama.”

“Will you and this man be giving me grandchildren?”

“No.”

She sighs and tuts at you. “Will I at least get to meet this man? You didn’t bring your last girlfriend to meet me, and look what happened! I will judge him. Is he there with you?”

“Yes.”

“Ask him what time next week he’s free.”

“Mama, I don’t think –”

“Marco Bodt, _I will meet your boyfriend_.”

You turn towards Jean. “I’m taking you to my mom’s house next week, when are you free?”

He laughs, loudly enough that your mom can hear –

“He has a nice laugh, I like him already,” she informs you.

“I’m free all day Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.”

“How about a week from today?” You ask your mom.

“Good. Dinner, of course, lunch and breakfast are no good. Can he cook? What’s his name?”

“His name is Jean Kirschtein, and –”

“French? _Kirschtein._ German?” She sighs. “No nice Italian man for my boy, I suppose. _German_. He can’t cook.”

“He can, mama, he helped me cook dinner tonight.”

“Well of course he can, but there will always be something _off_ about it, you mark my words, Marco. 7 works, I assume? Unless you’ve started eating dinner early?”

“7 is just fine, mama.”

“Good. I won’t invite your sister. She has children to take care of. And I want to meet your boyfriend on my own.”

“All right.”

She huffs. “You never give me good answers. I’ll see you next week. I love you.”

“Love you too, mama.”

I roll over and plug the phone onto the charger just as it lights up – Sasha.

_Oh good I was worried you wouldn’t find them!!!!!! No need to pay me back but if you don’t call me tomorrow I’m raiding your safe, I know the combo. Good night ;)_

You ignore her. “We have to be at my mom’s house by 7. Meet me here by 6? It’s a half-hour drive, I think –”

“You think?”

“It’s been a while since I went up there. I think that’s why she’s eager to meet you. You can drive me up there. I could ask Sasha, though –”

“Why don’t you ask Sasha to drive you up more often?”

“My mom kept trying to set us up. Sasha had to shove her ring in my mom’s face before she gave up on it.”

“I’ll drive.” He tugs me down towards him. “Does she speak any English?”

“She speaks English just fine, she just hates it.” You can’t lie down on your right side; this isn’t going to work.

Jean figures out the problem and shifts to a squat so he can jump over your legs to sit on your left side. “Oh, perfect. Does she hate French less?”

“She doesn’t speak any French at all, actually, and hates the fact that she can understand a few words because of their similarity to Italian words. She doesn’t like not being able to understand the entire language.”

“English it is, then.” He lies down on his back and pulls you against him. It doesn’t work too well – you’re taller than he is – but a couple minutes later, you’re comfortable. Jean stretches up to turn off the lamp, and you’re ready to sleep – but you don’t.

The two of you talk, in low voices with quiet laughter and light kisses, until the clock on your bedside table tells you it’s one in the morning.

“Jean?” You whisper. “Why do you like pastels?”

He doesn’t answer.

You close your eyes.

Maybe it’s a dream, but you don’t think it is.

“ _The world is dark enough, Marco. Like hell I’m gonna add to it._ ”


End file.
